From the first days of manufacture of hand tools, particularly those of a gripping type, the operator usually grips the tool with one hand and the work piece with the other. Typically he holds the work piece and tool in front of his chest, where he may readily view the work and where his hand is capable of applying a high degree of force.
In recent years a number of hand operated tools have been developed employing internal force limiting springs and the like designed to provide measured force to a pair of jaws for example used for crimping electronic terminals onto wires. There has been a stress on the use of force limiting tools and those having a minimum force before which the tool will release in order to improve the reliability of electrical connections so manufacturered. In certain cases, rather complex hydraulically and pneumatically actuated tools have been developed but these have proved to be quite expensive and in fact in most cases too expensive for assignment for each individual worker. Therefore hand tools have persisted for this type application. The power actuated tools have a further disadvantage that despite regulated hydraulic or pneumatic pressure, mis-location of the work piece or other variations can damage the terminal so that in fact the hand tool properly used by an assembly personnel can provide more reliability in products than the power actuated type.
One disadvantage of the hand tool is the fact that continued and repeated use of the tool is quite tiring to the worker and in certain cases the handles, in their unoperated positions, are so far apart that merely grasping the tool to begin the actuation step is a strain. This is a situation where hand operated tools are desired but assistance under manual control in which the force applied is actually manually generated is preferred. I have found that many tools, particularly electronic crimpers, are used by women with naturally smaller hands and grasp. In many instances two hands are required by female operators to actuate their tools leaving no hands to hold the work piece. This problem is eliminated by my invention.
Heretofore an effective bench modification for hand actuated gripping tools has not been provided.
Frequent tool recalibration, often required with power actuated tools, is not required using my invention.